The present invention is related to discoidal shaped aircraft.
The aerodynamic advantages of saucer shaped craft have been sought after in commerical, private and military aircraft design. A balanced spinning disc is capable of sustained flight as evidenced by the toy "frisbees" of current popularity. Discoidal flight is known and particular reference is made to it in U.S. Pat. No. 3,359,678.
This flight principle is claimed to be put to use in an invention disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,946,970 in combination with vertical thrust means. The disclosure relates to a "gyroscopically stabilized vertical takeoff and landing aircraft". The craft includes an outer spinning ring that does not, of itself, produce vertical lift during takeoff or hovering of the craft. Instead, lift is provided by downwardly directed thrust produced by conventional jet or rocket engines. Part of the engine thrust is diverted through a complex ducting arrangement to produce rotation of the ring. Thus, the craft has the advantage of the spinning disk principle during horizontal flight but necessarily relies solely upon the downward thrust of its engines to accomplish vertical takeoff or for hovering.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,801,058 to C. P. Lent issued July 30, 1957 discloses a saucer shaped aircraft. Lent discloses the principle of forming a disc from a standard aircraft wing shaped configuration and producing thrust in radial directions about a central axis over the annular surfaces of the discoidal wing. The inventor claims that sufficient lift is provided by directing radial thrust across an annular ring to provide vertical takeoff and hovering capability. The nature of the craft, however, does not permit simultaneous rotation of the annular wing for a spinning disc effect, nor is additional thrust provided for lift during vertical takeoff or hovering situations.
Applicant has conceived of the unique combination of air foil configuration and the spinning disc principle that represents a substantial improvement over known forms of discoidal aircraft. Lift is produced both by the discoidal spinning wing moving through ambient air and by thrust from internal engines which is directed over the discoidal wing surface configurations and which also produces the wing rotation.